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Special Events

Each year the park offers a number of special programs to help you explore and learn about the park. Come tap your toes to old-time music at the Music of the Mountains festival, enjoy stories of bygone days at the Festival of Christmas Past, or marvel at the park's beautiful wildflowers at the Spring Wildflower Pilgrimage.

Wildflower Pilgrimage

April 21-25, 2015

The Smoky Mountains are a haven for spring wildflower enthusiasts. Join us for hikes, walks, lectures, and programs (both indoors and outdoors) on natural and cultural history. Search for salamanders, learn about aquatic insects, visit an air quality monitoring station, go on wildflower, fern, or tree identification walks...and more. For information about the pilgrimage, including schedule, and fees, please visit http://www.springwildflowerpilgrimage.org

Music of the Mountains

April 17-19, 2015The Music of the Mountains festival was created to share the rich musical traditions of the Southern Appalachians with our park visitors. Enjoy traditional Appalachian music during this three day event held at Sugarlands Visitor Center and in Townsend, TN and Cosby, TN. Please refer to these dates on the Schedule of Events for additional information.

Junior Ranger DaySaturday April 23, 2016Children and their families can join in a variety of free, hands-on activities including ranger-guided walks, historic toy making, visiting a blacksmith shop, and exploring touch tables with animal skins, skulls, and scat. Information about specific programs is available at each visitor center. This year's theme will be "Find Your Park." Children can earn their Junior Ranger badge by completing three of the specially-planned activities.

Colorful quilts hang on display at Cosby in the Park.

NPS Photo

Cosby in the Park
May 16, 2015Celebrate Southern Appalachian culture with music, hikes, and demonstrations of blacksmithing, quilting, corn shuck dolls and crafts, old time toys, natural foods and medicinal plants, and other folk arts. Plus much more!

Women's Work Festival at the Mountain Farm Museum
June 20, 2015 A woman's work is never done! Join us to learn about the vital role women played in creating and maintaining a mountain home. Demonstrations of open hearth cooking, spinning or sewing, corn shuck doll making and more.

Enjoy traditional Southern Appalachian music at the Mountain Life Festival.

NPS Photo

Mountain Life Festival at the Mountain Farm Museum
September 19, 2015Celebrate the fall harvest as the Mountain Farm Museum comes alive with history. Demonstrators provide visitors with a glimpse into the past as they make soap, apple cider, sorghum molasses, hominy, music and more.

Festival of Christmas Past
December 12, 2015Join us to celebrate Christmas in the mountains with old-time music, harp singing, storytelling and reminiscing, craft demonstrations such as weaving, spinning, quilting, basket making, historic toys and games, and children's activities.

Holiday Homecoming
December 19, 2015Enjoy an old-fashioned Christmas celebration in the Smokies with traditional music at the Oconaluftee Visitor Center